The Morning-ish Heresy 8/1/12: Take Two Delusions And Call Me In The Morning

August 1, 2012

Your daily digest of news and links relevant to the secular and skeptic communities.Today's morning heretic is Tony Lakey, CFI Intern Extraordinaire. Paul is still out building his giant evil robot. I have discovered that it is going to be able to makes pizzas and that it may or may not be fueled by the tears of infants (which is probably the reason for having another child). Paul will be returning on August 13th. CFI Director of the Office of Public Policy, Michael De Doraurges you to tell your representatives to reject a bill to ban abortion in DC. De Dora has this to say about the bill:

“H.R. 3803, sponsored by Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ), would prevent a woman from having an abortion in many important situations: where continuing a pregnancy could put at risk her health or ability to bear children in the future; where she is suffering from mental illness; and where she has learned of a severe or fatal fetal anomaly. It would also impose criminal penalties on any physician found to violate the law, including up to $250,000 in fines and two years in prison.

This bill is wrong for several reasons.

H.R. 3803 is based on the assumption that fetuses can experience pain at 20 weeks. However, this is unsupported by existing scientific research, which suggests fetuses do not experience pain until at least 29 or 30 weeks. Furthermore, only 1.4 percent of all abortions happen after 21 weeks, and those usually occur due to urgent health dangers or difficulty accessing abortion services.”

A Colorado preacher tries to explain where God was during the Aurora shooting; the commenters don’t seem to agree.The Catholic Church backs out of a property sale to a gay couple, and then inadvertently forwards them the email explaining that it is because they are concerned about gay marriage.
The Food and Drugs Administration of India bans the prescription of 'allopathy' meds, so Homeopathy 'doctors' go on 3-day strike. Continuing their tradition of providing less and expecting it to do more.A good piece on the relationship between the Chick-fil-A controversy and free speech. Turns out that people on both sides of the issue need to read their Constitution more closely. The aptly named Bad Catholicexplains his beef with the recent comic from The Oatmeal criticizing religious intolerance

On a more positive note, a Connecticut judge has ruled DOMA unconstitutional.More good news? Okay! Today marks the start of comprehensive preventative care coverage for women in accordance with the Affordable Care Act. And now back to the upsetting: A New Mexico private school that received more than $60,000 tax dollars this year has rejected a 3 year old from their program because he has gay parents.The Texas GOP officially rejects critical thinking in their 2012 platform. (Do I even need a joke here?)Global Warming denying scientist changes his mind due to … EVIDENCE! (His study was even fund by the Koch Brother. I bet they are pleased.)Quote of the DayToday’s quote is from Gore Vidal who died last night at the age of 86:

“Once people get hung up on theology, they've lost sanity forever. More people have been killed in the name of Jesus Christ than any other name in the history of the world.” -Gore Vidal

Linking to a story or webpage does not imply endorsement by Paul or CFI . Not every use of quotation marks is ironic or sarcastic, but it often is. Follow CFI on Twitter: @center4inquiryGot a tip for the Heresy? Send it to press(at)centerforinquiry.net!